Let’s Move Mountains Today

We tend to fall into society’s mold of what we should do and how we should behave. We start to lose focus of the open-ended dreams we had as children. The wonder of what is truly possible if we just decided to go for it. But something happens along the way. We start to doubt our awesomeness because we have stumbled. In those stumbles, instead of gaining confidence and finding another way, we lose focus and start to buy into the chatter going on around us.

You can’t do that. It’s time to grow up. That’s not the way life works. Follow the guidelines of ‘normal’…

and so on. But it’s actually about breaking the mould that is “normal” to everyone else in finding our own greatness. What inspired you when you were young? What did your dreams consist of? Do you ever find yourself daydreaming about a “better life” or some deep-down desire that is weighing on you?

What’s to stop us from going after it? Aside from everyone else’s opinions and “realities”; the only real thing standing in our ways is US.

Now, life isn’t ever going to go as planned, right? We can follow the blueprints and do what everyone else is doing and somewhere along the way; things will fall apart. It’s not within our control and most times and it’s the way it’s supposed to happen for us (whether you believe in God, destiny or mother nature; this is true) but we can tend to self-blame ourselves and fall into a deeper hole of being “safe” versus acceptance and restructure.

Safety is a good habit, if practiced correctly. Safety is about, well, being safe from harm. What it isn’t is, being safe from a challenge. Challenges and risks are part of life. If we didn’t risk anything, we would never change. But playing it “safe” can be downright boring and sooner or later, we will look at those who jumped in with both feet and are now enjoying some rather amazing results and wonder why not me?

I had my own life mapped out, just like you did. I knew I’d be married and have a family. I knew we’d be church-attending, God-fearing people. I knew that we’d work to do our best and provide for our family and raise the kids to do pretty much the same thing we did. What I realize now, is that my “dreams” were kind of vanilla. They were downright BORING.

What I missed out on were the “details”.

Details are never included in our daydreams. I missed out on the fact that our family would have adventures. What I missed out on was the fact that we would attempt to cross the great big blue ocean and reside in another country; not once, but twice. I missed out on the fact that my children had their own wants and needs and desires and that we would unite as a family and make decisions that I could never have dreamed up. I missed out on the fact that the economy would tank – and in doing so – wipe us out financially and emotionally and make us re-think our “normal” lives.

What I’ve learned from our challenges and learning curves weren’t that life was cruel (although at many times I was guilty of thinking this); or that we made some “wrong turns” (which is what most people might think) or that we had to throw up our hands and concede to life’s challenges. What I learned, instead, was that this was our LIFE.

This was how it was supposed to be written. It was glorious, it was gut-wrenching at times, it was amazing, it was humbling. But all in all, it taught me lessons I could never have daydreamed about. My family has never understood each other better. Each of my children have learned lessons that my husband and I could never have “taught” them in our perfect daydreams. We have become closer and more understand of each other than I could ever hope to be. Our hard work in digging in and finding a way to get out of our hardships and through the challenges we faced, have forced us to be better and more capable people than we could ever have thought.

I am a control freak. I love a challenge. But it has always needed to be in “my” control. If things didn’t go my way, I’d seriously freak out. I suffered from ridiculous panic attacks, that simply put, were brought on by my need to have things to “my way”. I never allowed detours or changes in what needed to be. Through the past few years, I’ve learned to have faith and do what needed to be done…but also in seeing that changes will happen and I could either fight them and have a tantrum about it; or I could re-assess the situation and make another plan. I needed to learn patience and acceptance. And these lessons were soooo hard for me to learn. It was in just letting go of my “control” and trusting in the fact that my life was on the right track with God’s lead, that I was able to find my own peace.

I now suffer less anxiety. I feel more love and compassion for everyone in my life. I want to do more and be more and accept more of what is. Life didn’t go as planned; but what fun would that be? And what type of person would I be if that was the case?

Be you. Be willing to go through challenges and learn from them. Be willing to accept that there will always be challenges. Learn to adapt and to grow and to thrive in those challenges.